- The Company has trained a total of 175 female Kuwaiti engineers through four generations of its ‘Kuwait’s Engineer Girls’ program
- This year’s cohort falls within the framework of the Minister of Youth Affairs Office’s Job Creators initiative which aims to cultivate job opportunities for Kuwaiti youth
Kuwait, Limak Inşaat Kuwait S.P.C. marked the completion of the fourth generation of its training program for female engineers, the ‘Kuwait’s Engineer Girls’, at a graduation ceremony held on November 7 at the Kuwait National Library. Carried out under the support of Kuwait’s Ministry of Youth Affairs, the fourth cohort celebrated 88 new graduates despite being held virtually due to constraints imposed by the COVID-19 pandemic.
Modeled after Limak Holding’s ‘Turkey’s Engineer Girls’ program, the ‘Kuwait’s Engineer Girls’ program focuses on empowering female engineers by equipping them with management and leadership skills that help them succeed in their professional careers. In Kuwait, the program has successfully empowered a total of 175 female engineers to date, many of whom have accepted job offers at Limak or other top companies in Kuwait’s public and private sectors.
This year’s edition of the program, which began on May 17, falls within the framework of the fourth edition of the Minister of Youth Affairs Office’s Job Creators initiative which aims to cultivate job prospects for Kuwaiti youth. Due to limits imposed by the COVID-19 pandemic, Limak altered the program’s components to conduct the majority of the lessons online or partially in-person following social distance and safety requirements stipulated by the Ministry of Health and other official governmental authorities in Kuwait.
Speaking at the graduation ceremony held two weeks after Kuwaiti authorities announced the fifth and final phase of the country’s five-stage economic reopening plan, Limak Inşaat Kuwait S.P.C. Country Manager Mr. Kayihan Bagdatli said: “We are pleased to celebrate the graduation of the fourth cohort of our ‘Kuwait’s Engineer Girls’ program, and recognize the young engineers for their hard work, dedication, and significant achievement. Working with the Ministry of Youth we trained four times as many engineers and adapted to challenges posed by the pandemic by moving a majority of the program online. I’d like to thank everyone who helped make this year’s cohort a success, and I wish the graduates the best of luck as they join their fellow program alumni in Kuwait’s workforce.”
During the ceremony the Director-General of Kuwait’s Public Authority for Youth, Dr. Mishal Al-Rubaie, expressed his delight that the female engineers had completed the training program, commemorating its success in empowering women and professionally qualifying them for the private sector’s labor market.
Dr. Al-Rubaie said: “The Kuwait Engineer Girls program, which focuses on developing participants’ leadership and management skills to help them succeed in their future careers, is one of the results of the authority’s collaboration with Limak. It is overseen by the program’s director and faculty member at Kuwait University, Dr. Amani Buqammaz.” Adding: “The program was held as part of the Job Creators initiative, which is part of the state’s development plan (2021-2025). The initiative works by developing integrated youth programs within the projects of the National Youth Policy that have been approved by the Council of Ministers and assigned to the Public Authority for Youth for implementation.”
The ‘Kuwait’s Engineer Girls’ program is run by Limak Inşaat Kuwait S.P.C. in partnership with Kuwait University and Turkey’s Boğaziçi University. The project-based learning program consists of over 200 training hours involving workshops and seminars led by professors and experts from Turkey’s Boğaziçi University and Limak Inşaat, as well as training and social distanced site visits to Limak’s projects in Kuwait, such as the Kuwait International Airport New Terminal 2. (T2). The first cohort of the program (Generation I) was successfully completed in December 2017 with 32 graduates, the second cohort (Generation II) was completed in December 2018 with 30 graduates, the third cohort (Generation III) was completed in December 2019 with 25 graduates, and the fourth cohort (Generation IV) was completed in July 2021 with 88 graduates. Upon completion of the program, graduates are awarded a Business Technology Education Council (BTEC) Management and Leadership certificate recognized in over 100 countries, a certificate from Boğaziçi Lifelong Learning Center (BULLC), and a Certificate of Field Training from Kuwait University.
Limak is a long-term and strong supporter of youth and female empowerment in the engineering and construction industry. The Company’s support for engineers is part of a larger regional effort to add permanent value to society by supporting education and learning opportunities in the fields of construction, engineering, architecture, and project management. Limak’s other ongoing programs in Kuwait include the Training Program for Kuwaiti Newly Graduated Engineers and Architects by the Kuwait Fund for Arab Economic Development (KFAED).
